BackgroundWildgoose is a treasure hunt based events company located in the south of England. They specialize in cost-effective corporate and family based events using a treasure hunt theme. These events are based around the UK and Europe.

ChallengeThe goal was to develop an intuitive, easy to use website which gave Wildgoose the flexibility they required in order to continually build the system as their business grew.

In addition, the system needed to perform well in search engines and have optimization features out of the box.

Why SitefinityThe key area that Sitefinity excels is its non-restrictive architecture and this was a major selling point for us. The Wildgoose project not only had direct CMS requirements, but also custom elements that we would have to be develop and integrated into the CMS. Sitefinity has this out of the box with its extremely flexible architecture, and we were able to implement those features and have them live inside of Sitefinity.

Technical DetailsThe Wildgoose website was built in approximately 8 weeks from design finalization to launch and uses technologies such as ASP.Net 3.5, SQL Server, JQuery and Sitefinity.

ResultsWildgoose now have an easy to manage, search engine friendly and flexible system, which allows visitors to easily navigate and find the information they are searching for.

Wildgoose Treasure Hunts is a location based treasure hunt company, specializing in fun and cost effective treasure hunt based activities for both corporate and general consumers. The Wildgoose website performed admirably in that it ranked well on Google and contained all the relevant information required, however this was not down to the design of the website or its administrative interface but to the extensive hard work carried out by Wildgoose website editors.

The original website was beginning to outgrow itself, with pages becoming rigid, hard to edit and maintain and key information was not always easy to find for website visitors. The brief was simple, give us an intuitive system that is also flexible and allows Wildgoose to have full control of the information. In addition, Wildgoose did not want to manage page after page or products and locations but utilize a template based system that would allow them to manage these items separately from the standard page model of any Content Management System (CMS) utilized.

The Solution

Modika is a technical web development agency that builds both intuitive and engaging web based solutions. We have been looking at Sitefinity for several months and could see the potential it could bring to a project. The key for us as a Microsoft based company was that we could intuitively use the Sitefinity system in an environment that we knew and it meant we could concentrate on delivering solutions as opposed to learning different technologies. Additionally, having used Telerik products in the past we knew we were dealing with a trusted brand and partner whose support staff is second to none in the software industry.

Once we had established a relationship with Wildgoose and fully understood their requirements we saw that Sitefinity would be the perfect solution as it would enable us to utilize the powerful features it has out of the box, but also add our customized elements to better suit the direct needs of the client which sat just outside the boundaries of a typical CMS.

Because Sitefinity works intuitively within Visual Studio we had next to no learning curve so the project was quickly setup and under way. We were quickly able to define the layout templates and styling using features that we were familiar with, such as master pages and cascading style sheets (CSS). In addition to using many of the out the box features such as the library and news modules we also utilized the extensive customizability of Sitefinity by producing a products module that allowed Wildgoose to edit product and location information in a specific management system that still worked within the CMS.

Finally one of the most powerful features utilized was the control template architecture employed by Sitefinity. We were not bound by the default structure of pre-built modules and could easily and effectively customize any part of the system. We utilized this to great effect by changing the structure of the news list control to better suit the approved design.

The Results

The Wildgoose website is both engaging and truly representative of the Wildgoose brand. Sitefinity has allowed us to quickly design, develop and implement a solution that not only allowed content editors to quickly and efficiently manage content, but also produce a site that is built on web standards and is search engine friendly.

The original Wildgoose website served its purpose but its lack of flexibility meant that editorial staff were very restricted in the content they could produce. The move to the Sitefinity platform has given us the core base on which to build and not be restricted as the Sitefinity architecture allowed us to easily modify and extend any part of the system.

Wildgoose are delighted with the outcome of their new website as they now have a great looking, easy to use and flexible solution. Additionally, they now know they have a platform that can grow with their business, whether that is adding new content or creating bespoke areas to improve management, they are secure in the knowledge that their system will seamlessly cope with any new challenge.

From the perspective of the design and development team we have thoroughly enjoyed using the Sitefinity platform and are pleased to have it as our CMS of choice when implementing website solutions. We are safe in the knowledge that not only do we get an excellent product, with extensive features and limitless flexibility, but that we are always backed up by the excellent Sitefinity support staff.

Schedule one-on-one online consultation

Progress, Telerik, Sitefinity and certain product names used herein are trademarks or registered trademarks of Progress Software Corporation and/or one of its subsidiaries or affiliates in the U.S. and/or other countries.